The People's Assembly Against Reason

Parliament voted – narrowly – to deny a vote on the referendum to sixteen-year olds. Cue the outrage from the left, the Jockanese, the Euro-fanatics… and all twenty-seven teenagers who can actually spell Parliament. But they can join the army, get married, pay tax, say those who insist this shows their maturity, to which the response is that they need the permission of an adult for the first two and we all pay tax anyway. Besides, at sixteen they are not considered responsible enough to buy cigarettes and alcohol, so ya-boo-sucks. The plain fact is that children and politics don’t mix well. (And some people never grow up at all.)

If you want an illustration of that maxim you need look no closer than the infantile posturing of the People’s Assembly Against Austerity and their ill-mannered protest against what the largest proportion of our democracy voted for. In particular, the Socialist Worker Student Society betrayed their true motives with the following call to arms: “Hate the Tories?” they asked and in the same breath went on to conflate so-called austerity with racism… simply because in left-wing politics (the natural politics of the very naïve) non-sequiturs trump reason every time.

(Don’t tell them ‘fightback’ isn’t a verb)

So, let me see if I’ve got this. In response to the declared wishes of the electorate to get our economy back on track they will engage in economically disruptive social and civil disobedience actually intended to directly harm the micro-economy of local organisations and businesses. They will deny small businesses trade by deterring footfall, yet have zero impact on the global industries they despise. It doesn’t sound very grown up to me. But maybe I'm not being generous enough; maybe they know exactly how ineffectual their movement is and this is more of a social event than a serious protest?

As for the racism, is it just coincidence that the student banner blatantly uses the Palestinian flag colours? Oh, of course, silly me; it isn’t racism if it is: A) People the left despise, or B) Anti-semitic. You have to love the joined up thought processes of the left which mirror exactly those of the immature; I don’t like it, therefore it is to be abhorred by all. Or what? You’ll stamp your feet and withdraw your labour? Will you also forego your benefits for the period of your demonstrations? After all, it is those you despise who pay for your idleness. End austerity? God help you if you ever come to know real austerity.

The Commons also voted to, quite rightly, not allow foreign nationals living here to vote in the referendum, so a double hooray for common sense. Except in the eyes of those too blinkered by the certainty of youth, whatever their age, I suppose that is racist. For an example of the stupidity of those who rely on the race relations industry to maintain their righteous outrage look no further than those, like Yasmin Qureshi, who can’t tell the difference between a lone racist gunman and two billion people who follow a doctrine of extreme prejudice against anybody who doesn’t believe what they believe. Be it politics or religion, skin colour or culture, there are none who hate so blindly as those who do it because they are told to.